Colton thought he was going crazy. Throughout the day he kept picking up his pen, trying to get the pop-up box to display once more. It never did. Around mid-day, after two girls giggled and pointed at him, he stopped waving the pen around while he walked between building.
His mind kept going over the stupid dream he had last night and then the box regarding his pen. Colton wondered if he was suffering from some form of PTSD, but then he shook it off.
“Nah, I’m not traumatized,” he muttered, “… well, maybe a little stressed… and weirded out, but not traumatized.”
“Did you say something to me?” a cute brunette stopped and asked him.
“No, sorry. Just going over lines. Sorry.”
The brunette smiled and kept walking. UNCO was a theatre magnet and there were enough kids here as theatre majors that he could use that line without looking crazy himself. He has got to get his crap together before he convinces himself that he just might be nuts.
When Colton finally made it to his car, he was back to his normal self, more or less. Monday’s were a light day, and he’d be able to hang out with Camille. She didn’t have classes until Tuesday and she should be back from her sister's house by this evening. Camille hadn’t responded to his text all afternoon, but that wasn’t a shocker since she was driving through Wyoming on I-80. Cellular service sucked in Wyoming unless you had their local phone provider. Verizon worked well enough, but who could afford them?
Colton threw his bag onto the passenger seat and put on his seatbelt. His latch didn’t work half the time, so he fiddled with it until he could pull on the belt without it coming undone. It was one of that ‘fix-it someday’ items that he never had time to do. When he turned the key to the ignition, the starter groaned like his father does when in the main bathroom and was trying to tell the world he was dropping a deuce.
“I guess, I’ll add ‘replace starter’ to my list as well,” Colton grumbled.
After a few failed tries, his car finally roared to life and his glass pack told every student and professor in Greeley that Colton was leaving the parking lot. He loved the sound of his car, he just wished it wasn’t so much work to fix. He’d taken his car into the dealership a few times, but they were so dang expensive that he couldn’t afford to have them breathe on his car.
###
“Hey, kiddo. How was school?” Colton’s mother, Rae, asked when he walked in the door.
Rae was making the dinner in the kitchen, wearing her usual ‘Kiss the cook’ apron that she wore on barbecue nights. Her red curly hair and dimples brighten everyone’s mood. She stayed home and raised the kids until Colton entered high school. Rae now has a part-time job so she can be home early in the afternoons.
“Fine. Just a few more months and I can say goodbye to school forever.”
Rae sarcastically laughed. “Don’t be so sure of that. A bachelor's degree was fine when your Dad and I were in school, but you’ll probably need a Master’s degree if you plan on working for the bigger corporations.”
Colton’s shoulders slumped, and he sat himself down on the counter stool. “I know, but can you at least let me dream a little?”
Rae laughed. “Sure. You’ll also be super rich from winning the lottery next week.”
“I’m winning the lottery?” Colton asked enthusiastically.
Colton had to act fast as Rae threw her oven mitten at his head. He snagged the mitten out of the air inches from his face and laughed with his mother. They talked about school and the dreaded conversation about Camille.
Rae often asked Colton when they would get married and give her grandbabies. She knew they wanted to wait until they had a professional career and deep down agreed with their decision to hold off on children. However, she feared Camille would get pregnant while they are still unmarried and that bothered her sensibilities.
This book was originally published on Royal Road. Check it out there for the real experience.
After skirting around the marriage conversation Colton when upstairs to his bedroom. His room was little more than 10x10 and barely large enough for a bed and a small desk, but it was all he needed. Colton had bought a 32 inch TV from the pawnshop last year from a few bucks. Pawnshops hated buying televisions from customers since they were so cheap in the stores and took up so much space on their floor. He bought the TV for ten bucks and he knew the shop owner was ecstatic for unloading it.
An erotic Samarel poster hung above his bed. The painting depicted a woman taking off her panties with her back turned towards you. The piece was benign and tasteful, otherwise, his mother would have killed him. However, it sure made him feel great coming home to it on the wall. It wasn’t cheap, but all fine art has an expense to it.
Colton threw his backpack onto his bed and pulled out the pen that triggered his odd behavior earlier this morning. He sat down in his desk chair at the foot of his bed and stared at his pen intently.
“Come on! I’m not crazy. What is wrong—”
The pop-up box suddenly appeared above the pen.
Brand: Zebra
SKU: 22218 ⁕
Spec: … ⁂
Durability: 1/3 ⁕
Quality: Poor
Status: Low Ink ⁕
“Ha! I knew it!”
A tap on his bedroom door shook Colton out of his euphoria. “Yeah?”
“Is everything all right, honey?” Rae opened the door partway and poked her head inside the room.
“Yeah, mom. I just figured something out and got excited.” Colton gave her a sheepish grin.
“Well, I’m glad you figured out how to use a pen finally,” Rae said with a snicker.
Colton realized he was still holding the pen triumphantly above his head and lowered his arm. He gave her a small shrug and a smirk. “It’s been a challenge for me. Did you know that when you click the bottom of the pen the tip comes out?”
“Hmm. I didn’t know that… I guess I should pay more attention,” Rae stated with mocked sincerity. “Dinner will be ready in a half hour. If you can figure out how to tell time next, come downstairs for some ribs.”
Colton chuckled and slowly nodded head, “That’s what Google is for Mom.” He pulled out his phone and pressed the microphone icon. “Set a timer for thirty minutes.”
The phone chimed in and told him it set the timer. Rae shook her head in disbelief. “I swear Colton… You’re a ham. I’ll see you downstairs in a few minutes.”
Colton gave a mumbled curse after his mother left since the pop-up went away after his mother knocked on the door. However, it only took him a few seconds to realize that he needed to think about what was wrong with his pen in order for the pop-up to return. On a whim, he pulled out his notebook and got a pop-up regarding the notebook.
In a frenzied twenty minutes, Colton became very proficient at querying and receiving pop-ups on all the items within his bedroom. He realized by accident that he didn’t even need to pick up the item in order for the pop-up to appear. Books, shirts, socks, the desk, his bed, and even the money in his wallet popped up property boxes.
“Amazing. It’s just like OOPs,” Colton mumbled at little more than a whisper. Since the advent of object-oriented programing, programmers have learned to classify items using concepts of “objects”, which contain data, in the form of fields, and code. The code gave objects a function.
You could say Dog, Puddle, White, and 5 lbs and fit that into an object. Then you could say the dog would eat, sleep, bark, and growl as its function. OOPs have their place in software development especially with databases and working with repeatable software code. For example, if you were writing a video game of kids playing in a dog park. You wouldn’t want to program the code on how to bark each time your virtual dog barks. Plus, they could use the same code every time any a dog barks. The Object for your dog could state different frequencies for the bark, gait, height, friendliness, or whatever.
Colton picked up the original pen again and studied the properties of his pen. He felt the quality of the pen was better than poor, but he didn’t understand the ranking system, so he shrugged it off. He focused on the Spec’s line and nearly fell off his chair when line after line of property boxes scrolled across his vision. “Slow down!” Immediately, the scrolling slowed, and he read lines for everything from the ingredient of the ink, to the size of the pen’s ballpoint.
Colton shuddered as he contemplated the implications of having so much information about… everything. He knew everything about this stupid pen and he guessed part of that information was proprietary. Colton closed his eyes and tried to think about what he could test his theory about proprietary information. A small smile spread across his lips.
Colton’s phone alarm sounded and interrupted his thoughts. “Oh, well, I’ll check it during supper.” Colton threw everything back into his backpack and set it onto his desk before heading downstairs.